We've previously reported on the exhaustive study by the non-partisan News21 consortium which found just 10 incidents of possible voter fraud that might have been deterred by polling place Photo ID restrictions in all 50 states from 2000 to 2012. That report was based on all of the official actions filed in each state during that time period, of all forms of potential voter fraud or voter registration fraud or, more broadly, election fraud in general.

But now Levitt --- a constitutional and democracy law professor at Loyola University Law School, who also works on related issues with NYU's Brennan Center for Justice and frequently testifies as an expert in various law suits and hearings regarding voting rights --- offers an update to those numbers. The results are remarkable, though unsurprising to those who have followed the creation of this Republican stalking horse for the past decade.

Levitt's offers an even more expansive investigation than News21's, and includes all known incidents and allegations, even those which haven't been filed formally with election or law enforcement officials.

"To be clear," he writes, "I'm not just talking about prosecutions. I track any specific, credible allegation that someone may have pretended to be someone else at the polls, in any way that an ID law could fix."

His explanation of what he has found --- from every known allegation of this type of voter fraud between 2000 and 2014 in all 50 states --- is staggering, to say the least...

[R]equirements to show ID at the polls are designed for pretty much one thing: people showing up at the polls pretending to be somebody else in order to each cast one incremental fake ballot. This is a slow, clunky way to steal an election. Which is why it rarely happens.

I've been tracking allegations of fraudfor years now, including the fraud ID laws are designed to stop. In 2008, when the Supreme Court weighed in on voter ID, I looked at every single allegation put before the Court. And since then, I've been following reports wherever they crop up.

To be clear, I'm not just talking about prosecutions. I track any specific, credible allegation that someone may have pretended to be someone else at the polls, in any way that an ID law could fix.

So far, I've found about 31 different incidents (some of which involve multiple ballots) since 2000, anywhere in the country. If you want to check my work, you can read a comprehensive list of the incidents below.

To put this in perspective, the 31 incidents below come in the context of general, primary, special, and municipal elections from 2000 through 2014. In general and primary elections alone, more than 1 billion ballots were cast in that period.

Some of these 31 incidents have been thoroughly investigated (including some prosecutions). But many have not. Based on how other claims have turned out, I'd bet that some of the 31 will end up debunked: a problem with matching people from one big computer list to another, or a data entry error, or confusion between two different people with the same name, or someone signing in on the wrong line of a pollbook.

So there are just 31 known potential incidents across the nation, over 14 years, of the specific type of fraud which might have been deterred by the polling place Photo ID restrictions that the Republican Party across the country continues to pretend are needed to prevent fraud.

It's precisely that type of statistic which leads folks, like this recent caller to a North Carolina talk radio show, to realize they have been lied to, hoaxed and betrayed when confronted with the actual facts on the issue that GOP media outlets like Fox "News" seem to keep forgetting to mention when they pretend there is some sort of a "voter fraud" epidemic across the country. There isn't. It's a scam.

In actuality, as readers of The BRAD BLOG have long known, for years, such restrictions are a completely transparent attempt to keep millions of largely Democratic-leaning voters --- minorities, elderly, students and the poor --- who lack the very narrow, specific type of state-issued Photo ID required under these laws, from being able to cast their vote at all. That's exactly what the federal judge in Wisconsin recently found when striking down that state GOP's version of the law as unconstitutional and a violation of the federal Voting Rights Act. In that case, as in virtually all of the other trials over these type of laws in other states, the Republican defendants could not offer even a single case of voter fraud in the state in recent history which might have been deterred by their suppressive law.

"It is absolutely clear," Circuit Court Judge Lynn Adelman wrote in his landmark ruling [PDF], that the WI law would "prevent more legitimate votes from being cast than fraudulent votes."

That's also precisely what Levitt has found:

In just four states that have held just a few elections under the harshest ID laws, more than 3,000 votes (in general elections alone) have reportedly been affirmatively rejected for lack of ID. (That doesn't include voters without ID who didn't show up, or recordkeeping mistakes by officials.)

See Levitt's full piece at WaPo for a detailed accounting of each of those 31 cases of potential voter fraud that might have been stopped by polling place Photo ID restrictions, as well as a bunch of fraud cases that decidedly could not have been deterred, despite being oft-cited, misleadingly, by proponents of such laws as the reason why such draconian restrictions on the right to vote are "needed".

[Hat-tip Stephen Heller]

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NY times did a piece on this citing Joseph Rich about 7 years ago, the 31 cases sounds a little low, but in the same ball park that they were talking about then, I think referencing prosecutions during the fist term of the Bush (2000-2005 or so) administration, around a dozen convictions.

In that study by the Bush DoJ, as we discussed when it came out, there were actually ZERO cases of fraud found that might have been deterred by polling place Photo ID restrictions.

Back then, however, folks knew so little about these particular laws, that ANY evidence of "voter fraud" (of any type) was used by Republicans to disingenuously support for the notion that polling place Photo ID restrictions were needed to stop it.

got ya. I only started following your site about 2 years ago, I had stumbled upon this article 7 years ago and did not hear much discussion about it in any mainstream outlets. Your points seem valid, I do not pretend to be any expert on this subject. But the broader point I thought was, even if those 11 or so had committed fraud, it's 11! And the disenfranchising of voters is what? In the 10's of thousands? Great blog, keep up the good work.

It is unfortunate that bloggers such as Brad Friedman, and so-called "scholars" such as Justin Levitt, intentionally deliver misleading information about this topic. This data proves that PROSECUTIONS for this kind of fraud are rare. It does not prove, and does not even try to prove, and comes nowhere near proving (and intentionally vastly misleads about) that the actual CRIME is rare. And in fact, which is well known but F & L fail to mention it, the crime is far more common than 31 occurrences in a billion votes. It certainly occurred over 2000 times in the famous Florida 2000 election, i.e. exceeded the Bush-Gore margin of victory, according to data collected and reported on by the Miami Herald proving at least that many illegal votes occurred. I mean, if
just one newspaer in just one state, in just one election, finds a number of instances of illegal voting F=far, far exceeding the whole country for decades according to Levitt... which Levitt never mentions... then we know Levitt is deceiving us. This is a dis-service to us all, and I know it is intentional since I told this to Levitt.
And this proof by the Miami Herald based on comparing "who voted" lists with residency data, was probably only a fraction of the real rate.

That being said (and I'm tired of perpetual deceptions on this matter; Democrats always lie and pretend the problem is smaller than it is, while Republicans always lie and pretend it is larger than it is; but from journalists and scholars I would vainly hope for a non-lie, I mean, if they had any ethics and competence) --- we still must ask:

Q1. is the problem large enough that it is worth having ID card requirements, or is the problem smaller than the problems that would be created by those requirements?

Q2. do other problems far exceed this one?

Q3. If we had the ID cards, would it solve the problem at all?

A1. It appears that many, maybe all, of the voter-ID laws being foisted on us, are intentionally designed to create statistical biases in the vote based on who would have various forms of ID.
These biases seem to exceed the rate of this kind of voting fraud
in the contemporary USA that I am aware of.

A2. In Florida 2000, the number of people excluded from voting by 95%-bogus "felon's lists" was over 20000 and that is not counting the fact that due to people with the same name (and the lists give no, e.g. social security numbers, only "race") probably far more than 20000 were effectively excluded.
This far exceeds any established rate of voter fraud in the contemporary USA that I am aware of. It also appears to have been an intentional vote-biasing effort by Florida.

A3. The Miami Herald's identification of 2000+ illegal votes relied on residency data. ID cards would not know up to date residency data (unless everybody kept that data updated --- anybody planning on committing this crime would not plus
plenty of people not planning on crime would not either, just because it would be a hassle) hence
a large fraction, probably the vast majority, of instances the Herald identified, would not have been prevented by voter IDs.

It seems possible in principle that nationwide ID card would
solve a lot of problems in voting, commerce, finance, etc etc, but it also would carry a lot of risks (i.e. create problems) too, such as identify theft risks. It depends how well it would be implemented. whether it would be a good idea.

It is unfortunate that bloggers such as Brad Friedman, and so-called "scholars" such as Justin Levitt, intentionally deliver misleading information about this topic.

That's a very serious accusation, Warren. But, if true, I'm very happy you jumped in to help us out...

the crime is far more common than 31 occurrences in a billion votes. It certainly occurred over 2000 times in the famous Florida 2000 election...according to data collected and reported on by the Miami Herald proving at least that many illegal votes occurred.

First, this article and this issue --- as I'm fairly certain you know (given what you said later in your comment) --- is not about "illegal votes occurr[ing]". It's very specifically about the only type of illegal votes that GOP-supported polling place Photo ID restrictions can possibly deter.

You seem quite clear on that point by the end of your own comment, when you admit: "The Miami Herald's identification of 2000+ illegal votes relied on residency data. ID cards would not know up to date residency data (unless everybody kept that data updated --- anybody planning on committing this crime would not plus plenty of people not planning on crime would not either, just because it would be a hassle) hence a large fraction, probably the vast majority, of instances the Herald identified, would not have been prevented by voter IDs."

Nonetheless, if you have evidence that there was "over 2000" instances of in-person impersonation in FL, as you charge in the first part of your comment (before contradicting it in the last part of the same comment), I hope you'll feel free to point us to the actual evidence to support that claim.

If you cannot, I'll have to assume that, to quote you, you are "intentionally deliver[ing] misleading information about this topic."

Why you would want to do that --- or accuse me or Levitt of doing same --- is beyond me, frankly.

I'm not sure what you have refuted Warren. A news paper ran an article once. Ok. Where were the prosecutions if there was so much evidence? How was the data for their story obtained, who verified it? It is also hard to take seriously your rant when you start out with so many accusations and present no sources for your argument other then, some newspaper article, and never explain their methodology. Why didn't the Bush administration jump all over this obvious evidence? It would seem to solidify their claims of victory if they showed how easily these illegal votes added up in Florida.

Sorry I cannot edit comments, but Warren, nearly everything you stated, you made up. Can you provide an article which states that 2000 votes were proven to be illegal? Also, the articles that you loosely quote reference cases were in 2000, one dead person supposedly voted and were several non US citizens had registered to vote. There was no evidence of fraud but a mistake at a Virginia DMV. And why didn't Rick Scott push for prosecution? Surely if the fraud were so wide spread a few dozen convictions should have been easy.